


Your Love is Like Friendly Fire

by comtessedebussy



Series: Enslaved Mage Verse [2]
Category: Person of Interest (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Slavery, Dirty Talk, Dominance, First Time, M/M, Mage!Harold, Magic, Magical Stamina, Manhandling, Marking, Multiple Orgasms, Orgasm Delay/Denial, Plot What Plot/Porn Without Plot, Possessive Behavior, Power Dynamics, Rough Sex, Submission
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-21
Updated: 2016-07-21
Packaged: 2018-07-25 22:30:57
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,909
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7549777
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/comtessedebussy/pseuds/comtessedebussy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A direct sequel to The Storm in the Heart of the Sun. John and Harold consummate their relationship, which is made more exciting by the fact that Harold is a mage with magical powers.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Your Love is Like Friendly Fire

**Author's Note:**

> Title taken from the Conchita Wurst song "Colors of Your Love" 
> 
> "And my heart is like a battlefield  
> You made me surrender  
> And you light me up like gasoline  
> Your love is like friendly fire."
> 
> Thank you to idinink for beta'ing and excitedly squeeing over this fic.
> 
> Some worldbuilding notes: this is part of a larger verse, as is the fic to which this is the sequel. In this verse, mages are feared by humans, and thus enslaved and collared. Harold is an extremely powerful mage who has never been enslaved or collared, and who recruits John for the same job of saving numbers as in canon.

They break apart from the kiss eventually.

Harold still looks shell-shocked by the proceedings, but he doesn’t offer any more protests, and John accepts that as a win.

“I admit I don’t quite know how to proceed from here,” Harold confesses.

“Taking us back to civilization might be a good start,” John quips. He feels like he could dance on air – and with Harold’s help, he might actually be able to.

“One moment.” Harold turns away from him, and John catches the look of concentration on his face. The scattered branches gather themselves, the flattened, withered, burned grass rises again, bright and green, while trees sprout again in the distance.

“Wait. You can fix everything you just did?” John asks, incredulous.

“Not everything. I’ve likely wrecked much of the present ecosystem for years to come, but what little life I can return to this place, I intend to.”

John watches as small saplings turn into trees, as grass grows waist-high again and flowers blossom. He stands as still as he can, taking in a world coming to life around him, all bolstered by a spark of life breathed by Harold. Harold, who could create as well as destroy.

“Harold,” John says, awed, “you are a better man than most humans I’ve known.”

Harold’s ears turn slightly pink. John finds it endearing – Harold’s a mage, with the power of life and death literally in his hands, but he ducks modestly at a simple compliment.

Finally, he offers John a hand. “Shall we?” he asks, and when he takes it, he finds himself in Harold’s arms, brought there in a graceful sweep of the arm that was the stuff of romantic dances in romantic movies. He’s suddenly breathless, face to face with Harold. “Hold on,” Harold says, and the world around them tilts again. Then they’re back to the familiar sounds of New York – traffic in the background, the patter of rain, and the myriad other sounds of civilized life.

“If you’ll give me a moment - ” Harold putters around, cleaning up the magical tools he’s used and erasing the symbols he’d inscribed in the floor carefully.

“Why don’t you just do that with magic?” John asks. Now that he knows just how much of it Harold has, he realizes that Harold could never lift a finger in his life again and have anything he could ever want.

“Magic leaves traces.  All the authorities will be looking for me now, which is why it would be best to leave as few traces as possible.”

“So every time you use magic, you’re risking exposure? Why didn’t you tell me?”

Harold shoots him an incredulous look. “And what, pray tell, would you have done about it? Besides, its traces are miniscule anyway unless I perform some particularly large feat. And I’ve been hiding for – “ he catches himself. “A while. I like to think I know a little something about it.”

“I know you do,” John says. “I just worry about you.”

Harold’s smile is also a laugh. “I am quite certain I just demonstrated exactly why you _shouldn’t_ worry.”

“If anyone ever found out….the more powerful a mage you are, the more they fear you. And the more they fear you, the more they make you suffer.”

“I’m sure of it,” Harold says. He puts the last of the spell ingredients away and turns to John. “But that is something we will worry about another time. I thought perhaps – “ Harold’s ears turn a little red again. It’s still endearing. “Dinner?” he asks.

John’s never heard of anything more enticing in his life. “Sure,” he agrees. “That Chinese place near your safehouse downtown?” he offers.

“My thoughts exactly,” Harold agrees. “And as it’s late, if you wanted to spend the night…” Harold trails off shyly.

“Yes,” he agrees quickly. He doesn’t know quite how far Harold is willing to take – this – tonight, but even the thought of being near Harold tonight renders John mindlessly happy. He grabs an overnight bag he always keeps packed in the library and offers Harold his jacket.

They exchange an amused smile. _I could have gotten that myself,_ Harold’s says. _I know,_ John replies.

Outside, he attaches himself to Harold like a leech. He’s aware it’s clingy, but he really, really doesn’t care, and Harold doesn’t seem to mind either. Harold _simmers_ below the surface, a power that’s not being radiated, exactly, but that’s not quite dormant – it’s more potential than power, really, like static electricity before a storm, but with none of its unpredictability. John doesn’t know if it’s Harold’s emotions, still in turmoil from the day, or his power, not quite under control for the same reasons, but either way, he _likes_ it.  Harold is like a storm in a bottle, made of a glass specifically engineered to contain hazardous materials, created by Harold’s brilliant brain, and John loves this feeling of complete safety as he feels currents of power flow beneath his fingertips.

They eat in silence – both of them are starving, and John practically inhales the food. That doesn’t stop Harold from reaching out a hand, or John from taking it. They eat one handed, the other hand a link between them. Finally, as they wash up – John standing closer to Harold than necessary – Harold breaks the silence.

“There is a second bedroom,” he suggests tentatively, “if you wish to make use of it.”

John can feel his face fall. Everything had been going so well, and he’d gotten lost in it, but perhaps he was wrong to expect so much all at once. After all, what could John offer a mage as powerful as Harold? Harold had already given him so much, and John only had his clinging need to give in return -

“John.” Harold’s voice breaks into John’s thoughts. “I did not mean that I do not want you. I do. I merely thought that, given what I am, if you wanted to proceed more slowly, I would find it entirely understandable.”

“No,” John says. “I want you.” And, to prove his point, he leans in to kiss Harold. The same currents of power are still there, below Harold’s skin, and kissing him still fills John with the same feeling of being pleasantly electrified. Before he knows what he’s doing, he finds himself pushing Harold backwards until they hit a wall. Harold lets himself be manhandled, pliant beneath his hands, and John, who _needs_ Harold so much he feels like he’s starving, kisses Harold passionately. Used to being the stronger one of his partners, he instinctively goes for Harold’s wrists, takes advantage of Harold’s lack of protest to pin his wrists above his head, certain to the utmost that Harold could easily stop him from anything he did not want John to do. But his brain kicks in halfway through, and the contrast of the power simmering below John’s hands, the power that could easily make John stop, and the ease with which Harold allows himself to be…to be _dominated_ \- clash in John’s mind.

Harold takes advantage of his momentary stillness to push John gently away. John steps back instinctively.

“What’s wrong?” he asks with concern. “Too much?” just as he realizes how gently Harold’s been touching him. Almost like he didn’t _want_ to touch John.

“You should put a collar on me,” Harold says instead.

John blinks.

“What the hell are you talking about?”

Harold looks down, seeming ashamed.

“You’ve seen my power. You know how great my capacity to hurt you is. If you truly desire – “he waves a hand, almost helplessly, “this. _Me,_ ” he adds uncertainly, “you should take precautions.”

“No,” John says. He has a hard time thinking of something he’d like to do less. Actually physically _hurting_ Harold, maybe, but that’s about it. “Absolutely not.”

“John – “

“I’m not collaring you, Harold. It’s – that’s – collars are for _ownership_ ,” – he spits the word out with disgust, “and for _protection,_ ” he adds, and he hates this word as much. “I’m not going to _claim_ you, and I most certainly don’t need to be _protected_ from you.”

Harold reaches forward to touch his chin, keeping John facing him. “I’m aware that it’s considered bad etiquette, to say the least, to speak of one’s previous partners while intimate with one’s current partner – “

“What happened?” John interrupts.

“When I was with Grace, we – made love. I was used to controlling my power, and most of my emotions, but I had never before felt passion like that. It was a new feeling, and I didn’t know how to control it. When I touched her- it was like putting a live wire against human skin. I still remember her screams.” 

John shrugs. He and pain are intimate friends, and the thought of it doesn’t bother him. Besides, he’d willingly go through torture _for_ Harold. The idea of protecting himself _from_ Harold when he practically belongs to the man is bizarre.

 “It’s fine,” he says. “I don’t mind if you hurt me.”

Harold look at him is utterly aghast. Then there’s that frown of concentration he gets when a piece of code isn’t compiling and he’s trying to figure out if it’s a forgotten comma or if the code has some larger issue. He reaches forward to trace a scar on John’s chest, barely hidden by the shirt, from a bad electrical burn during a torture session.

 “You can’t mean that,” he says pointedly.

“I do. I’ll be fine. And if anything happens, you can heal me, right?”

Harold sighs. “Your complete disregard for your own wellbeing will be the death of you.”

“Not with you around,” John insists. “Have you thought about how I’m pretty much invincible thanks to you?”

Harold frowns. “I have hurt too many people in my life for that to be even remotely possible. Nathan, Grace – “

“Harold,” John interrupts. “I’m not putting a collar on you. You’ve never been collared in your life, and I’m not going to be the first one. I want you – as an equal,” he says, though it’s not quite true – he’s not Harold equal, not by any stretch of the imagination. “Or not at all. If you can’t agree to that – “

Harold reaches forward again, this time to caress John’s face. His fingers are loving, a sentiment John can read in them so clearly that he wonders if Harold’s purposefully broadcasting it.

“I’m scared, John,” he says candidly.

John catches his hand where it’s on his cheek, brings it to his lips.

“I’m not. I told you. I’m not afraid of you. I trust you. Even if you don’t trust yourself,” John adds, heading off Harold’s next remark at the pass.

Harold trails his hand from John’s lips, down to his chest, where he keeps the top few buttons of his shirt unbuttoned, to where the two folds of the shirt come together.

“If I hurt you in any way, if I do anything, you must tell me,” he begs. John doesn’t think he’s ever seen Harold beg, not quite like this, looking at him with such desperate, pleading eyes.

“I will,” he promises, entirely honestly, or as honestly as he can given that he will likely have to exert a concerted effort to even pay attention to his well-being.

Harold undoes John’s buttons slowly and patiently, and John himself loses patience after about two buttons, when he kisses Harold again while dragging him towards the bed. Harold goes obediently, but just before they reach the bed, he reverses their positions deftly, falling onto the bed with John on top of him.

John can feel himself get hard again almost instantly; his arousal had waned slightly during the utterly unsexy argument about collaring Harold, but the mere touch of him brings him back to hardness almost instantly. The new position lets him rub himself against Harold, to feel the heat and the something else, the energy, perhaps, of his body, which just sends sparks of arousal through him. Harold pushes him up gently, and he finds himself standing in between Harold’s spread legs as Harold reaches up to unbutton the rest of his shirt and divest him of it. Having done so, he runs gentle hands over John’s body, tracing his scars.

“You should let me heal these,” Harold says pensively.

“No. It’s fine. If magic can be traced – “

“The amount required would be absolutely minor. Let me at least heal the ones that I’m responsible for,” Harold begs him.

John can’t say no to that.

“Oh, all right,” he agrees, and feels the familiar surge of heat against the skin of his abdomen. The scar from the bullet wound he’d gotten in Ordos disappears. So does the other one, above it, the one from a CIA sniper on a rooftop. Harold isn’t really responsible for that one, John thinks, but it’s too late by then.

John catches Harold’s hand as he reaches for another scar, one on his shoulder.

“Harold,” he says impatiently. “You’re killing me here.”

Harold draws away his hands from John as if he’s been burned. “Did I injure you? Where – let me see – “ he looks desperate, panicked.

“Harold,” he says, this time with an amused smile. “You haven’t hurt me. It’s just, well – “ he glances down at his hard-on pointedly. “If you don’t let me touch you, _now,_ I’m going to rip your clothes off and pin you to the bed.”

Harold does smile at that. “I would like to see you try,” he says wryly, but the next moment, he’s sitting completely naked before John. John’s mouth falls open.

“That was one of my best suits; I can hardly have you ruining it with your – human _needs._ ”

John laughs and does pin Harold to the bed. He takes advantage of the opportunity to explore every inch of Harold’s body, so tantalizingly covered in at least three layers until now. He mouths at Harold’s neck and enjoys the way his breathing speeds up, bites his throat playfully and catalogues the hitch of breath it elicits, and runs a trail of kisses from the hollow of his throat down his chest.

“John,” Harold interrupts him as he’s somewhere between Harold’s chest and his stomach.

“Mmm?” John murmurs into Harold’s skin without stopping.

“I should warn you that – _oh,_ “ he says, as John playfully bites a nipple. He rallies and makes a valiant effort to complete the sentence. “That – ah – my stamina is not quite – human.”

That does get John to look up, hungrily.

“Really?” he asks. “How many times can you – “

“I don’t know. I’ve never had the opportunity to – find out.”

John smirks widely. “We’ll make it an experiment,” he says, and dives down to find Harold’s cock with his mouth.

“There is really no need – “ Harold begins, but his sentence quickly runs into a brick wall as John closes his mouth around him. He forgets his own needs for the moment – his desperately hard, straining cock – to use every trick in the book on Harold. He sucks at the head, eliciting breathy little pants, then sucks it down all the way, which brings a gasp of shock to Harold’s lips. He likes the way Harold feels in his mouth – there’s still that undercurrent of power, in this part of Harold as everywhere else, but unlike actual electricity, it doesn’t make his mouth feel numb. Instead, it just feels – different. Like he’s wielding something powerful, which could either destroy him or give him everything he’s ever wanted, and it’s all balanced on a hair.

At some point, Harold’s hand reaches to grasp John’s hair, and John expects Harold to control his movements, thrusting his head up and down to use his mouth. Instead, Harold runs a hand gently through his hair before dropping it to his side. John ignores his disappointment and focuses on getting Harold off instead. This is one of those things he _knows_ he’s good at, and sure enough, pretty soon Harold’s short breaths turn into moans and whines.

He chances looking up, and only then notices the way that Harold’s hands are gripping the bedclothes, as if he’s holding on to the bed for dear life. And then he notices the sparks – the ones flying out from Harold’s hands. They dim before they fall on the bed, though some do singe the bedclothes before going out.

 _Oh,_ he realizes. _That’s_ why Harold wasn’t touching him.

Perversely, it makes him want to get Harold off even more, and even more mind-blowingly. He wants to see what kind of explosion he can cause. He sucks Harold down again all the way, relishing the power and the heat.

“John –“ Harold gasps, and John can’t quite tell if it’s a warning or a request. He keeps Harold in his mouth, working at him with his tongue, and moments later he feels Harold spill inside him. It tastes – and feels- much like a human would, John remarks, but unlike a human, Harold emits sparks. They fly everywhere this time- singeing the expensive bedspread even more, and he hears a lightbulb crack somewhere in the room.

But, as Harold had predicted, he doesn’t go soft in John’s mouth.

John has a few ideas about where to go from here, but he decides the most important thing to do right now is to kiss Harold again. Harold’s hands are feather-gentle as they hold him, his lips soft and sweet as John bites at them.

John draws away to look at Harold. He looks thoroughly debauched, his hair sticking up at every angle, his glasses askew, his cheeks flushed. His hands are on John, but soft, uncertain, as if unsure how to touch, how to be intimate.

“Harold,” he says. “It’s okay. I’m not going to break.”

Harold shoots him a pointed look as another few sparks come from somewhere in the vicinity of Harold and singe the bedclothes some more.

“It is not a judgment of your strength, or your will, or your ability, when I worry about harming you, John,” he says.

It’s a little too much like praise, and John absolutely can’t take it, would rather have the burning and the sparks and the scars instead, so he goes for Harold’s jugular, sucking bruises into the skin with an obscene sound. He almost thinks he’s trying to make a point by marking _Harold,_ but then Harold’s also making delicious keening noises, and John wants him those going.  

“You’re incorrigible,” Harold mutters, somewhere between two moans, and John ignores him in favor of that delicious spot at the hollow of Harold’s throat. He hasn’t kissed it yet, and he wants to know what sound Harold makes when he does. Any protests Harold tries to make are lost when John licks a long, tantalizing stripe from the hollow of his throat up to his Adam’s apple.

“You are absolutely _criminal,_ ” Harold complains, and John decides that he’s forming too many coherent sentences. He plants his mouth on Harold’s and lines their bodies up, taking them both in hand and stroking with sure, practiced strokes. Sure enough, Harold is still ready and aroused, and John’s dick has been begging to come for at least the past ten minutes. It doesn’t take long for either of them to climax, spilling together on Harold’s stomach. He plants his head in the crook of Harold’s shoulder and breathes with relief and release; the mere touch of their bodies causes him to feel like he’s being embraced by the currents of power that still emanate from Harold.

 “I had rather had something different in mind,” he hears Harold say distantly.

“We have time,” John reassures him. “I may be human, but I’d like to think I can at least sort of keep up with you.”

He hears Harold chuckle. There’s finally a hand carding pleasantly through his hair. Two orgasms must be enough, John thinks absently, for Harold to stop being scared of setting him on fire.

“How do you want me?” John asks shyly into Harold’s skin.

Harold’s hands move to his hips and manhandle him until he’s straddling Harold.

Exhilaration surges through John at the simple act. He’s used to being physically stronger than his partners; when he’s seduced people for CIA covers in the past, he submitted as often as he played the part of the tall, dominant, dangerous stranger, but that submission rarely had anything to do with physical strength. Whether he knelt for a cover or bent over willingly for a partner, it was rarely because the other person could actually physically make him.

But Harold _can._ Of course, John would fall to his knees at Harold’s slightest command anyway, but the fact that Harold is _stronger than him,_ can easily take him, put him where he wants and keep him there, sends arousal coursing through him. His cock jerks needily, still spent from his previous orgasm.

Another flick of Harold’s wrist, and there’s a bottle of lube in his hand. “Show off,” John mutters, but still takes it.

“Touch yourself,” Harold instructs. “I want to watch you.”

Obediently, John slicks up his fingers and reaches behind himself. Harold’s hands hold him steady at the hips as he inserts a finger under Harold’s equally steady gaze. His eyes flutter closed in pleasure. It’s been so _long_ and the touch, even of his own finger, feels so criminally _good._ He sinks into a peaceful bliss in which there’s nothing but Harold’s hands on his hips and the sensations of his own touch.

“Look at me.” Harold’s voice breaks through the darkness and the silence he’s blissfully sunk into. His eyes snap open. Harold’s gaze is even more intense than before, and John finds himself looking away shyly, lowering his eyes until he’s looking at the space between their bodies rather than Harold’s face.

Harold sighs, but doesn’t issue another command.

Slowly, John opens himself up – two fingers, then three, then four. By the fourth, his cock is hard again, as much from the sensations themselves as from the knowledge that he’s opening himself up _for Harold._ He glances at Harold briefly and, at his nod, sinks down on Harold’s cock. Harold’s hands hold him steady as he does so, a firm grip that doesn’t let him go anywhere but down, doesn’t let him do anything but be taken by Harold’s cock. He lets out a breath he didn’t know he’d been holding.

“Fuck me,” he begs, and Harold does. He doesn’t move his own body; instead, he grips John tightly and fucks him on his own cock. As if John were nothing but something to _use._ Harold possesses every inch of him – his hands holding John in place, his cock spreading him open, his glance telling John that above all, he can’t touch himself.

His cowardly, rebellious hands still reach forward to touch himself, but he aborts the movement at Harold’s pointed glare. Instead, he clenches his hands into fists, closes his eyes, and lets Harold manhandle him. He falls into the movements, lets go of the tension in his body to surf the rise and fall like a wave. He lets every inch, every movement of his body be Harold’s.

Suddenly, John feels power surge where Harold’s hands are touching him. It doesn’t feel quite like being electrocuted, but there is heat there, and a feeling like static, and then suddenly John feels himself being wrapped in a protective cocoon – the same kind of that Harold had used to shield him from a killing spell. The next thing he knows, there’s sparks flying everywhere, lightbulbs exploding, glass shattering, and what feels like a small earthquake. The next moment, Harold’s hands tighten on his hips, and he feels Harold coming inside him, filling him, claiming him.

Harold, John realizes, has literally just come with explosive force.

The thought of it – the _power_ of it, the fact that it was him, _John,_ that brought Harold to this, that literally made Harold _blow things up_ by losing control – leaves any shred of control John had left. He hasn’t even touched himself, but his cock pulses and he spills himself all over Harold.  

Harold holds him firmly through the waves of his orgasm and its aftershocks. He feels limp and lethargic, ready to fall over as any tension that was left in his body leaves it along with his orgasm, but Harold effortlessly keeps him upright as he trembles. Finally, he stills and blinks slowly at Harold. His orgasm might not have shattered windows, but it felt equally mind-blowing, coursing through him while Harold kept him safe in his arms.

Harold hand traces the skin at John’s hips gently. He looks down; there’s a row of bruises from Harold’s fingers, and the skin around them is red from the surges of heat Harold’s hands had emitted.

“I hurt you,” Harold says sadly.

John’s never heard anything more preposterous in his life.

“Harold, they’re _bruises._ A human could leave those,” he says, pointedly glancing at the hickeys on Harold’s neck, which, John notes with some amount of satisfaction, Harold hasn’t made disappear.  

“You should still let me heal them.”

John grabs Harold’s hand faster than he’s ever reacted to anything in his life. “Don’t,” he says. “I like them.”

Harold is regarding him carefully, a small furrow between his brows.

“You like being marked,” he says, and John can’t hide the reaction those words send through him. Harold doesn’t fail to notice. “You want to be _claimed,_ ” he continues, and John doesn’t even try to pretend.

Harold’s hand moves up to his chest.

“If I may – “

John has no idea what Harold’s asking permission to do, but he doesn’t much care. He nods on instinct.

The first thing he feel is a surge of cold through his skin, so freezing it numbs it, then a surge of heat. There’s a moment- a millisecond – during which he feels a burning sensation, before heat and cold even out. When Harold removes his hand, there’s a mark on his chest.

Each mage, John had learned, had his own mark – one that he could leave as a sort of calling card when he performed magic, if he wanted it traced. Looking down, he finds Harold’s mark burned into his chest – but burned isn’t the right word. It looks red and shiny like a burn, but when he touches it, the skin is neither raw nor tender.

“It’s temporary,” Harold explains. “It would be too dangerous to let you go out into the field with my mark, and I’ll have to remove it before you go on another mission, but – “

“You marked me,” John interrupts. His cock twitches, making a brave attempt to harden despite John’s recent mindblowing orgasm.

“I can remove it,” Harold hurries to assure him. “If I overstepped – “ Harold looks shy again, scared of his own magic.

“Do it again,” John demands.

Harold does, moving over to the other side of John’s chest to leave an identical mark. John’s eyes flutter, his breath catching as he feels Harold claiming him. “Again,” John says when he’s finished, and Harold moves to leave a mark on his stomach.

“Again.” He’s begging this time. He closes his eyes, waits for the soothing surge of cold, the sharp sting of heat, so momentary that it’s an afterthought of pain, not even the thing itself.

Harold seems to have overcome his initial shyness; his hands move over John’s body with more confidence now. Harold leaves two more marks on his stomach, and while John’s riding the high of the pleasure-pain, Harold pushes him gently until he sprawls on his back. His eyes flutter open in surprise to see Harold towering over him.

“You’re _mine,_ John,” he says. His voice is even, but it’s not quite human – something supernatural rings behind it, a sort of echo created by what John is sure is Harold’s magic.

John does get hard at that; Harold’s voice – the power of it – goes straight to his dick, as if hardening at Harold’s pleasure. Which, John realizes absently, might actually be the case.

He spreads his legs enticingly, lets Harold know that yes, John is _his,_ to do with as he pleases. But Harold ignores John’s hardness, the offer of his body. “Mine,” he mutters instead, leaving a mark on the inside of John’s thigh. He continues – methodically, now, as if intent on marking every inch of John’s body. There’s another mark on his hip – right next to the bruises, one more on his other hip, then his other thigh, each one sending a surge of pleasure-pain that arouses him even more, makes him _need._

“Harold, _please,_ ” he finds himself begging.

“No,” Harold says simply, and turns him over. John whines needily and tries to rub himself against the sheets, but Harold’s hands are on his hips immediately, effortlessly holding him still. “No,” Harold says again.

John doesn’t move.

He barely breathes.

Harold leaves marks on his shoulder blades, all the way down to the small of his back. They don’t hurt, but somehow he can still _feel_ them, he knows they’re there, every inch of him literally claimed by Harold, as if Harold has written his name over every inch of John’s skin. Every surge of cold and heat is a surge of arousal, coursing through his entire body until it ends in his dick, making him _need,_ making him want to move, to rub himself against the sheets or touch himself or _anything,_ really. But Harold said “no,” and John takes deep, desperate, gulping breaths and holds still. He’s been trained for endurance as well as for pain, and he draws on that now, but every time he tries to return to that place he goes when he has to _endure,_ Harold sends another surge of arousal through him, which brings him back to the present, to his desperate _need._ Need that is, as John realizes, more difficult to resist than simple pain.

And Harold isn’t stopping. He holds out – valiantly, he thinks, while Harold marks every inch of his back and his arms, but then there’s another surge of pleasure at his hip and he just _can’t_ anymore. _“Please,_ ” he finds him begging. Harold merely hums contentedly and reiterates that John is _his._

John hangs his head between his arms and tries to gulp in more air, but there doesn’t seem to be enough in the entire room to satisfy him. It’s like Harold is a vacuum, sucking in all the power, all the matter, in the entire room, until there’s nothing but him and John, and John is completely at Harold’s mercy. John belongs to Harold, and nothing else exists.

He moans obscenely at _that_ thought, the idea that the entire world could belong to Harold if he wanted it, but here, in this moment, all Harold wants, all he’s claiming, is John – every inch of him. His body, his being…his pleasure.

“I’m yours, Harold, _please,_ ” John babbles.

“Yes, I know,” Harold says, sounding _bored,_ as if John had given him information anyone might know. He moves his hands again, leaving a particularly large (if John can judge by the surface area of his body that he feels heat up) mark on his ass. He chuckles – slightly hysterically, perhaps – at that.

 “What is so amusing?” Harold asks, in a voice that sounds clipped, but John can read the amusement in it.

“If you wanted to mark my ass, you could just spank me,” John says. At this point, he thinks that anything might be better than this tantalizing stillness. If Harold wanted to hit him, cause him pain until he cried out, even that might be better than being forced to not move.

Harold’s hand pauses; the sensations of heat and hold cease.

“Would you like that?” Harold asks.

If John wasn’t already holding himself as still as possible, he would have frozen. As is, he hides his face between his arms and whispers a barely audible “yes.”

Harold ignores John’s embarrassment, a fact for which John is actually infinitely grateful. “Another time, perhaps,” he says, and goes back to marking John. John doesn’t even try to hide his moan. There’s no point.

Harold marks the rest of his ass, then trails his hands down the back of John’s thighs for more marks. John’s pretty sure that by this point, there’s more of his skin that’s red and burned that there is that is unmarked by Harold. That very thought is arousing, eliciting another needy moan that Harold ignores.

Finally – _finally,_ just as John is starting to think that he’s going to absolutely lose his mind, and maybe that’s what Harold meant when he said he was dangerous, John feel’s Harold’s hands on his ass, opening him up. He’s still slick and open from the last time, Harold’s come trailing out of him, and it doesn’t take Harold long to prepare him. John holds himself still, barely breathes, afraid that a single movement from him might make Harold reconsider.

Harold sinks into him slowly, patiently, unceremoniously – as if he has all the time in the world, and nothing to worry about but his own pleasure. It’s intoxicating to feel _used_ like that by Harold, but also arousing, and John doesn’t think he can handle any more arousal right now without at least being touched. His hand twitches – his subconscious intent on giving him what he needs even as his conscious mind tells him to stay. Harold remarks upon it, because the next thing John knows, Harold’s hand is on his dick, stroking him – slowly, feather-light. Barely a touch. John wants to move into it, to move along with his strokes, but Harold’s other hand on his hip is a crystal-clear instruction that he wants John to stay _still._ He’s not sure what’s worse, the lack of touch entirely, or this cruel, tantalizing mockery of one.

John moans again, completely, wholeheartedly. He doesn’t think he could hold anything back at this point. All his training – of enduring, of holding it all in until he absolutely had to scream or cry out – had evaporated like water once the holocaust of Harold’s firestorm hit it.

Harold moves inside him equally slowly, languidly, almost as if his mind is on another matter, and his use of John’s body is nothing but an afterthought. Which, John realizes, it could very well be; he has no doubt Harold’s genius brain could handle sex and complex mathematics at the same time. And that – _that_ was hot too, arousing, the idea of not only being used but being used without even any attention being paid to it. It doesn’t prevent him from making obscene noises, from digging his fists into the bedclothes and panting harshly as sweat pours down his sore muscles at the effort of staying still. John doesn’t think he’s ever exerted this much effort to _not do_ anything.

But then Harold’s hand speeds up, starts to touch him just perfectly. The strokes are firm, confident just how John likes them, even at first, then speeding up, a thumb brushing over his slit on every other stroke. Every movement is sure and practiced just like everything else Harold undertakes, done brilliantly and perfectly with Harold’s infinitely competent hands. With Harold’s touch and his tacit permission, the arousal that’s been gathering in John’s body, building and concentrating itself on his dick breaks forth. Like water breaking through a dam not nearly strong enough to contain it, his arousal causes his entire body to shake with waves of pleasure that course through him. He sinks weakly down into the bed, his muscles no longer supporting him, and trembles under the tidal wave of pleasure. Everything around him is vague, washed out, the sounds of the room around him only barely audible, as if he’s underwater. Somewhere behind him, he thinks Harold has come inside him, but all the various parts of his body have become indistinguishable from each other; he’s one large mass of pleasure and satisfied need, and it’s impossible to tell where Harold is touching him and where it’s just the memory of his possessive mark sending ripples in addition to the waves of pleasure that seem intent on breaking him.

Eventually, he stops shaking, the aftershocks almost gone, and finds himself lying on his side, blissfully, lethargically. He blinks twice and realizes that Harold is sitting by his head, calmly petting his hair, while his – hard – cock is right in John’s line of sight. John suddenly feels self-conscious: his muscles barely function, and he doesn’t think he can orgasm again in the next few hours if his life depended on it, but Harold shows no signs of slowing down.

Realizing John’s at least mildly returned to reality, Harold smiles at him. “You were perfect, John,” he says, and John is sure he means every bit of it.

John looks down from Harold’s face pointedly down to Harold’s cock, then back to his face again. “You can use me, if you need to – again.”

Harold merely continues to smile. “I’m quite all right, John. Rest now.”

“But – “ John protests. He was never one to leave his partners unsatisfied.

“I have had all I desire from you and more.” Harold’s caress of his face is infinitely gentle, and John closes his eyes to nuzzle into it. “You were more perfect than I could even have imagined.”

John wants to shrug the praise off, to insist that he’s not worthy of it, but that requires moving. Effort. He doesn’t really see the point of it right now. Harold’s hand is so gentle in his hair, his voice so soft. He feels exhausted, but deliciously so – not the soreness he gets after a torture session, but that pleasant lethargy after a satisfying run when he’s broken his best time for a 5-miler. All over, he can still feel Harold’s marks, little patches of heat; they don’t hurt, but they make his body feel well-used, like a familiar gun whose intricacies he knows.

He curls up a little more, like a kitten being petted. Harold’s hand trails from his neck down to his shoulder, his chest. He doesn’t have to open his eyes to realize Harold is tracing the marks on his skin – _his_ marks. The ones that make John _Harold’s._

“How long will they stay?” he manages to ask.

“They’ll be gone by morning. If you’d like me to remove them now – “

“No,” John interrupts adamantly. It’s about all he has energy for right now, and he sinks blissfully back into the peaceful darkness of Harold’s caresses.

“You are a gift,” Harold says suddenly, “and more special than you know.”

That causes John to open his eyes and throw Harold a questioning glance.

“Usually it is the human that marks the mage. In the normal order of things, a human would shudder at being claimed by a mage, yet you allow me to mark you and call you mine. It is an honor, and one that I – never hoped for, certainly, nor even thought about it -  that would have been absurd.”

John marshals his forces. The conversation has gone from sweet talk to serious territory, and the least he can do is draw on the last of his strength to give this conversation the attention it requires.

“I _am_ yours. I’d do anything for you. I’ll belong to you,” he manages.

Harold’s glance is skepticism bordering on disbelief.

“I am more than flattered, John, but I realize now that this is not the proper time for such a conversation. Sleep now. We will speak in the morning.”

“I mean it,” John mumbles into the pillow, but Harold says “sleep” and he does.

When he wakes up the next morning, he spends several minutes lounging in the soft sheets and reliving his delicious, elaborate dream before reality knocks to remind him that it was not, in fact, a dream. He checks his body quickly, but Harold was right – the marks he’d left had faded. Still, his skin was red in places, particularly around the hips, were a telltale string of bruises confirmed that it was not, in fact, all a dream.

Then he turns his head and realizes that there was a much easier way to check whether all of this was real, because Harold’s blissfully asleep next to him. Mages did sleep, then; John had often wondered whether Harold ever actually used the bedrooms at his safehouses. Now he had an answer. It was a small discovery, but intimate and precious, the kind of tiny detail only a lover would know.

Perhaps Harold senses that he’s awake, or maybe it’s the movement, but he opens his eyes.

“Good morning,” John says happily, and doesn’t give Harold time to respond before diving in for a kiss.

“If you’re suggesting another round, I’m not sure it would be prudent considering I expect you to do something besides stay in bed the rest of the day.”

John considers. He’d like another round, and his dick twitches in interest at the thought, but he still feels so pleasantly sore and fucked-out that he’s not sure he’ll be good for anything today anyway, let alone if Harold has another go at him. In fact, he’s not sure that right now he’d be good for anything more exciting than literally being held down and used. Which, now that he thinks of it, is quite an intriguing idea…

“Not right now,” he agrees. “But, you know what would be fun to try?” He turns over with great effort, until he’s resting on his elbows and facing Harold.

 “Hmm?”

“You using me to get off as many times as you wanted to, and not letting me come.”

Harold looks faintly surprised, but also intrigued.

“You’d like that?” he asks.

 “Yeah. But only if you really _used_ me for your pleasure without caring about mine. You’d have to not let me get off until the very end, no matter what.”

“I think that can be arranged,” Harold says distantly. John can tell he’s already running through possibilities in his head, planning, considering the optimal protocols to follow. Harold has a way of treating everything like a computer program to be written, and John’s never really seen the flaw in that approach to problem-solving. On the whole, he’s found it quite satisfying. He feels a slight apprehension in the pit of his stomach, too – Harold tends to follow through with anything he takes up, and if he decides that he’s not going to let John come until Harold himself is satisfied….well, last night has given John a vague idea of how long Harold can last, and he already knows that if they do this, it’s going to be utter _torture._  

He doesn’t even bother to hide his smile. They still have a few kinks to work out, so to speak, but on the whole, he thinks that mages are vastly underestimated as lovers.

“I meant what I said last night,” he says suddenly. He doesn’t know what makes him say it, except that he’s giddy with happiness.

 “You said quite a few things last night, John,” Harold says wryly.

“The part about making me _yours._ I – if you wanted to, I wouldn’t mind.”

Harold stills, and all the lighthearted flirting vanishes from his face and tone; only deep concentration remains. “You were quite adamant about ownership last night, John, and quite disgusted by the idea of possessing another,” he points out. “A sentiment, I might add, that I share entirely; I have seen too many mages treated too cruelly by humans who considered them their possessions to ever want to lay claim to another being.”

 “I know,” John says. He looks down shyly. Harold’s right, in that slavery is _awful,_ something he can’t even imagine, and he feels terrible just bringing it up, making something that is such a cruel part of so many mages’ lives into a morning-after flirtation. His cheeks color in shame. He shouldn’t have brought it up, especially after last night; he was so adamant about this, about basic _human decency_ (the word disgusts him, considering how humans treat mages). But now that he’s brought it up, he’s stuck in a web of his own spinning, and he feels that he needs to at least _explain_ it to Harold, some of the convoluted mess of what’s going through his head.

“But it would be different with you. You’re a mage, and, well….” He feels himself blushing even more profusely. _“_ I’d _want_ you to own me.”

“So if I marked you, put a collar on you, and ordered you to kneel, you’d do it?” Harold asks pointedly.

John can’t even form a reply, can’t even _control_ himself, training be damned. His eyes flutter shut of his own volition, his breath leaves his body, and arousal forces his dick to give an interested twitch.

“You’d like that,” Harold says, sounding awed. “You’re human, and yet willing to _owned,_ by _me. ”_ John’s sharp intake of breath is more than an answer. “To be collared by a _mage,_ ” Harold adds, sounding even more incredulous, and again John’s body answers for him. His head is bowed now even as his eyes are closed, his body still, as if waiting for Harold’s next command – as if Harold already _does_ own him.

Harold tilts his head up gently by the chin.

“No being should ever truly own another, John.” Harold’s face tells John the morning-after banter is gone; they’re talking about Serious Things now.  “You are your own person, John; your being, your mind, your very soul, belong to no one but you. I have no claim on them.”

John nods, trying to look anywhere but Harold. He’s still blushing, ashamed at having even tried asking this of Harold. Harold’s hands are so infinitely gentle as they touch him, as they tilt up his chin and caress his chest, and how could John have brought something as _filthy,_ as repulsive, as the ownership of another being, into this sweet, bright place they’ve found for themselves, this soft bed covered in dappled sunlight on an early morning?

“Your body, however, and most certainly your pleasure,” Harold says, breaking into John’s thoughts with a completely different voice – no longer the patient explanatory tone, but the one that’s sharp-edged as a sword, “are _mine._ ” To emphasize the words, John feels the same surge of cold-heat at his chest, and when he looks down, Harold’s mark is there.

“It’s not permanent,” Harold explains, sounding as if he’s stating a fact rather than providing a reassurance. “I will have to remove it whenever you go into the field, but that simply means that I will have to mark you again each time the necessity arises, so that you can remember that You. Are. _Mine._ ”

Thrilled, John goes for a kiss. Harold catches his head, grabbing him by the hair, and holds his gaze. Waiting. John stares back, and feels like he’s in a staring contest with a tiger. He tries not to blink, but it’s irrelevant – Harold blinks and still looks more imposing than John can muster. John lets himself go still, pliant – ready and willing to go wherever Harold’s hands put him rather than taking the initiative.

Once Harold has ascertained that John is going to remain still, that he’s going to stay still and obey rather than come and take _,_ Harold drags his head forward to _take._

The kiss is a claim of ownership and the seal on a contract of possession.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Ритуал](https://archiveofourown.org/works/7939108) by [Fandom Person of Interest 2016 (Fandom_Person_of_Interest_2014)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fandom_Person_of_Interest_2014/pseuds/Fandom%20Person%20of%20Interest%202016), [Madoshi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Madoshi/pseuds/Madoshi)




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